If you want to join in the debate you are more than welcome, if you just want to take a dig at the staff then I suggest you do one.

Because if there are choices, you can bet your life some would take the crap (less healthy or balanced), option every day

Yep, admittedly at secondary rather than primary school but we had healthy alternatives at school. Did we eat it? Did we balls. We had pizza and chips. We were kids, it made sod all difference because we spent hours before during and after school playing either football or rugby in some form and got a decent meal at home.

Unfortunately quite a few never did and I reckon even more so these days. The reason school dinners were introduced was to ensure that kids got at least one decent meal a day. Unfortunately when we now see school kitchen "managers" being rewarded for saving money, as opposed to being rewarded for providing the best food for the money allocated, we get to the bottom line.

It is very obviously the fault of a parent if their kids aren't eating properly, unfortunately we have to admit that there are some pretty shi[it[/ity parents out there and I don't believe it is indicative of a nanny state, if we try to at least mitigate any nutritional shortcomings through good school dinners.

I don't hold out much hope, especially when the party in power is the same one who, when presented with evidence that rickets had been eradicated, dropped free school milk.

It's also not just rubbish parents who want/need children to have good quality meals at school. When I was younger due to the circumstances my father left us in the fact that we got a good quality hot meal at school was a massive help to our situation. I imagine that is (or would be) the same for a lot of people who are struggling at the moment.

We've gone so far away from what school dinners were meant for it's unreal. It's not that long since those entitled to a free school lunch were still able to get it in the school holidays so that they still got at least one decent meal a day.

[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-18472795Some very positive outcomes[/url

It seems that the strangest circumstances still stirr our souls as members of the same species, and that is great news!

[url=http://thevoluptuousmanifesto.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/never-second-thoughts_18.htmlThe questions the journalists should have been asking.[/url

Looking at the choices issue for a second and I think this angle is being massively over-egged if you actually look at A&B's lunch menu.

Like most of the Scottish councils they work on a 4 weekly menu plan and it seems that Martha Payne and her classmates have the grand choice of two hot things.

Here's a sample of their menu;

Week 2 - Monday (Family Favourites)

Chicken in Gravy served with Boiled Potatoes and Carrots and/or Cauliflower Cheese
Or Pack a Snack Selection including Hot or Cold Wraps with
tasty fillings served with Carrot Sticks or Side Salad (v)

Tuesday: Around the World
Burger served in a Bun served with Potato Wedges, Broccoli or Side Salad
Or Creamy Ham or Vegetable (v) Tagliatelli served with Broccoli or a Side Salad

Wednesday: An Italian Feast
Meatballs in a Rich Tomato Sauce served with Pasta and Corn Cobettes
Or Pizza with a Selection of Toppings (v) served with Crunchy Diced Potatoes and Corn Cobettes

There's no a huge amount of scope there for the children to be always picking the wrong option. Some larger schools in the area serve baked potatos every day and they have a choice of having a sandwich either. The issue, to me, appears to be the quality and quantity of the actual food. For example the pizza appears on another page of the menu described as being served with a "side salad" - is 3 slices of cucumber now a side salad? Children certainly shouldn't end up having a sandwich because the hot meal options are crap.

In one report the children were told that unlimited salad and bread was available to them, and had always been available to them. Can it be possible that the majority of children in the class missed that fact or could it be that it was something that was kept quiet because it is yet another area of cost cutting? Worryingly for those associated with the primary school is that it is part of a flagship joint campus, it shares with a nursery complex and the High School. So the kids will be exposed to the crap food they are being dished up until they leave school.

... or, as I have raised in the piece linked to above, is the school doing as it should, and the photographs do not represent the whole story?

Apparently, only Martha's parents have complained about the school meals. Why? What was the nature of the complaints? WY have no other parents complained?

And frankly, as I also also mentioned above, I do not believe that the voice in the blog is the voice of a nine-year-old child.

Perhaps Mr and Mrs Payne are peeved that, in offering choices, they give their child the chance to make poor choices - and that's why Daddy has, it seems, been 'behind' this way of trying to attack the school.

And an interesting side question: why are so many people so ready, apparently, to take what is being represented by the blog at face value, and assume that it tells the whole story?

It would appear that the whole sorry saga was actually the work of a sub-editor who thought they'd got themselves a "funny" headline. If they'd simply added one small word "up", hyphenated at the end of the word "fire", then I reckon none of this would have happened.

[url=http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2012/06/15/read-the-martha-payne-article-that-made-council-bosses-overreact-and-ban-her-blog-photos-86908-23896447/The offending article[/url

For me I'm happy to take it at face value because I know that is the same crap that gets given to kids in our local school.

If you can provide a 2 course meal for £1.75 and make good amounts of profit from it then, imo, you are cutting corners somewhere.

So you're saying that the council and the school are liars?

Or perhaps I have difference in opinion on what I think is an acceptable standard of food to be serving up the children to what they do?

NLC, like A&B, will tell you they offer up "good quality, nutritionally balanced meals" for school dinners. However go into the school behind us and I guarantee you that 4 days out of 5 your first instinct will be "that's crap, I'm not eating that".

The sad thing is any positive that could have come out of the girls blog will probably end up lost in a row between the Daily Record and A&B council.

GG - did you read the piece I linked to?

I've had a quick scan through and TBH I have no problem whatsoever believing that it is, for the most part, written by a 9 year old. There are occasional passages where a quick C&P looks to have been used but nothing leaps out. Both of my kids were producing written work of a similar quality and tone at that age.

First, was the child ever fed just one croquette to get her through an entire afternoon? This is an exaggeration downwards and it's one thing I doubt a child wrote. It looks as though intended to convey something that is not supported by what the school/council says.

So either the school/council are telling porkies or the blog is not representing the whole picture.

Would a nine-year-old child really consider the mater of one croquette (doubtful anyway, as just explained) in terms of it not providing energy for concentration, rather than simply not stopping her feeling hungry? And asking if it would do so for readers too? There have been ideas put into this child's head, methinks.

I repeat: the council and the school say that the pictures in the blog do not represent the entire picture. Are they telling lies? And all the other questions that this case raises.

On the quality of food: as a bit of a foodie, I would certainly hope that the standard of school dinners would be far better than represented in the pictures - and even by what seems to be best practice in Scotland.

Look over the Channel at France. They do not offer children a choice. In schools throughout the country, children are given a multi-course meal, sat down properly. Remember, France has far less childhood obesity than we do.

Then again, the French do not seem to consider that school dinners are just something to fill up poor children.

I think you'd be shocked at how poor alot of school dinners (outside public schools) are these days. Nothing like when we were kids both in quantity and content.

Isn't that how education works?

I wasn't thinking of it in quite that way.

I am well aware of the situation regarding schools dinners, which has been a direct result of Conservative policies.

My kids grew up during the Blair years. Why weren't those old Tory policies reversed?

Well think about it in thsi way then:

Dad: "how do you feel when you don't get enough to eat at lunchtime?"

Daughter: "hungry"

Dad: "anything else?"

Daughter: "tired"

Dad: "do you know why that is?"

Daughter: "because I'm hungry?"

etc

The girl has never claimed to have been given only 1 croquette as a whole meal for the whole afternoon. If you actually read the caption with the photograph then I think it's pretty clear that she's talking about the potato element of her meal. It's extremely petty of newspapers, the council or anyone to take her comments completely out of context like that.



She mentioned the pizza, but focused on the croquette - where is the harm in that. If you read through her blog she regularly speaks more about one aspect of the meal. In this case she chose to speak about the disappointing part of the meal.
I also don't see why it would be surprising that a child who is doing a blog about her school lunches and the impact of them would mention the energy aspect? Far better to pretty much accuse the Dad of writing the blog than to give the girls parents some credit for the fact that their daughter has been encouraged to think about food in terms more than just not being hungry anymore? Is teaching her about the energy gained from food and an enjoyment of food not a good thing?

I'm not getting into the choice issue again. I don't understand the train of thought that suggests giving children any choice is a bad thing. How many people from the era of "here's your meal - eat it" have food issues? Simply removing choice teaches children nothing about food, in the same way that rewarding children with pudding for eating everything on their plate teaches them nothing about self control, learning to understand your body etc.

Minty - you mention France and the sit down meal, that can't happen in the majority of schools here for one simple reason over and above any food issues - 45 minute lunch break, maximised school rolls thanks to the loss of other schools in the area (so the primaryschools local to us have 283, 197 and 201 pupils respectively) with a dining hall that seats 80ish. The children get approximately 15 minutes each to eat their lunch. No chance of a sit down, multi-course meal with time to learn to enjoy food in that time.

Also on the Tory aspect of it, I left school in 1997, but have been in and out the local schools because of various groups using them. The meals have gone downhill massively since the change of "School cook" to "Catering Manager" - that wasn't a Tory choice/change. The Scottish Parliment should have repaired the damage since they took over too, so there's blame on all political parties.

That's one post. And people put ideas into children's heads the whole time - it's kind of how parenting and schooling works. Rather than some sinister motive it could simply be that she's been told on numerous occasions about the importance of food to concentration and is repeating the idea. It's certainly not beyond the bounds of possibility that the post was produced by a 9 year old girl.

Ask for asking other readers opinions - she does that throughout the blog.


I don't believe that the blog ever claimed to be presenting 'the entire picture', did it? It's not presented as social commentary or a critique of the food policy in Scottish schools - it's a young girl sharing her opinion on the meals, inviting others to do the same, and doing a bit of fund-raising at the same time. The school itself certainly didn't seem to have a problem with it until the council threw a wobbly.


I honestly couldn't say what the average quality of school meals in Scotland is like, and I have no real experience of meals at primary school level in England - many primaries in England don't offer hot meals at all, including the one my kids attended. Most of the shots I glanced at didn't look unexpected TBH. School meals are done to a tight budget.

The whole choice thing is a red herring IMO. If you serve food that kids won't eat you either get wasted food and hungry kids, or you get stressed staff, kids, and parents when the kids are made to eat it. A certain amount of choice is fine - it's the balance over the long run that counts. There's also IMO only so much that the state/schools can do here. Healthy eating has to come from home - and this is why France scores better than we do on childhood obesity. They have a much healthier relationship with food - and drink - than we do as a society.


Not just the French. But here in the UK it's all about price and never mind value.

Ah, that old chestnut.

You see, destroying something is easy, putting it in place again involves cost.
Brown is always accused of spending too much, are you saying he should have spent more?